James Langley of Kursch Group unlocks the door to the bunker, which is made of 20,000 PSI concrete. The floors, ceiling and walls are two feet thick.

James Langley, Executive Vice President of Kursch Group Commercial Real Estate, walks up to equipment inside a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

Monitors and other interesting items can be found throughout a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

A switch hangs inside a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

A control panel lets the bunker's occupants see what's being used.

A furniture sits on the main floor of a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

A look inside the main floor of a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

Langley walks through doorways featuring 1,000-pound blast-proof doors. The bunker was built as part of a network designed to maintain communications with Washington, D.C., during the Cold War.

James Langley, Executive Vice President of Kursch Group Commercial Real Estate, walks the stairs inside a three story desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

A fence currently keeps people out of a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

A desert bunker north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

James Langley, Executive Vice President of Kursch Group Commercial Real Estate, unlocks the gates that surround a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

A large room houses the industrial size air condition equipment inside a desert bunker located north of Barstow on Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2014. The desert bunker, sitting on 2.5 acres of land, was a communications center in the cold war. It is currently up for sale.

“There’s a market for what it is,’’ Langley said, and it’s been marketed a number of ways.

It’s been pitched to communications and data storage companies, Doomsday preppies and developers of gas stations and truck stops. The sale could be packaged with up to 10.9 acres of commercial land for $1 million.

“There just are not a lot of people looking to buy a novelty item,” Langley said.

Stoffels is convinced this is a prime time to sell. “I’m trying to appeal to the right people by saying, ‘Own a piece of nostalgia.’”

Agreeing to talk about the bunker on grounds its location was not pinpointed, Stoffels said he bought the communications center on a “total fluke” when it seemed everyone was flipping homes for profit.

The self-described entrepreneur who got his start in the logging business and the “school of hard knocks,” and now invests in properties, was taken in by its originality.

“It’s like stepping into a time warp,” he said. “As you descend the stairs, you step back in time.”

ANALOG MACHINE

At the height of the Cold War, top-secret underground bunkers and missile bases were built across the United States. One famous installation in the mountains of West Virginia under The Greenbrier, a posh Southern resort, bore the code name, “Project Greek Island.” Dozens of bases in the Midwest were carved into the ground to launch salvos of Atlas and Titan intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Stoffels said the AT&T bunkers, built before satellites made analog dial-up practically obsolete, were built at 120-mile intervals in California to ensure constant contact with Washington, D.C., in case of an attack or catastrophe.

Mark Clark, director of the National Security Studies program at Cal State San Bernardino, said a Barstow-area AT&T bunker would have made strategic sense.

The George Air Force Base nearby and March Air Force Base in Riverside were two potential nuclear targets of the former Soviet Union, he said. Until the end of the Cold War, March was a Strategic Air Command base.

Stoffels simply liked the look of the place, and hammock-camped in it.

Stoffels said the building has a nuclear blast protector and a special scrubber to filter the air. “It’s got powerful generators,” he said. “One of the floors is floating on springs to accommodate a jolt.”

TIMESHARE OPTION

Even after the economy roiled through the Great Recession, Stoffels figured his investment would pay off, big-time, and it nearly did.

Stoffels entered into a purchase-option with Robert Vicino, a Southern California promoter of a doomsday plan, as the nation’s attention was focused on ancient Mayan calendar predictions of the world’s end in 2012.

He agreed to let Vicino take photos and video to market the bunker. Vicino began to collect reservations for an underground survival compound. The timeshare-styled pitch put the project on the radar of major TV news shows.

But that option never materialized, Langley said.

Stoffels said he cut away from that deal, and has taken offers since. Vicino could not be reached for comment.

“I don’t need to sell the bunker, but I’d like to,” Stoffels said. “I haven’t, so far, because I’ve gotten a boat-load of ridiculous offers.”

Ron Hubbard, owner of Los Angeles-based Atlas Survival Shelters, said he is well-aware of the bunker and its potential. “If I had enough people sign up, I’d probably buy it in a New York second,” he said, saying there’s a definite market for this kind of thing.

To many people these bunkers are like lifeboats, Hubbard said.

Right now, he said the price is a bit steep. “It’s not buying it,” he said. “It’s what it’ll cost getting it fixed up.”

When the price-is-right buyer does come along, Stoffels said he’ll hand over the goods that include a full set of drawings, manuals, schematics and old Polaroid snapshots that freeze-frame the Cold War building in time.

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